


Convesations We'll Never See: Twelve and The General

by attack_giraffe



Series: Conversations We'll Never See [2]
Category: Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Gallifrey, Post-Episode: s09e12 Hell Bent
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-14
Updated: 2016-01-14
Packaged: 2018-05-13 23:34:56
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,468
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5721256
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/attack_giraffe/pseuds/attack_giraffe
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The Doctor picks up the pieces after the events of "Hell Bent". Some pieces are bigger than others.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Convesations We'll Never See: Twelve and The General

 

“You don’t make peace with your friends.” -- Yitzhak Rabin

Somewhere in the time vortex, going nowhere and nowhen in particular, a man with a lot on his mind was noodling grumpily on his electric guitar. 

He’d spent a fair amount of time making sure the sound system in the console room was absolutely perfect, and he was a very skillful player. If anyone else had been traveling in the TARDIS at that particular point, and they’d had any ear for rock and roll music, they would have been reasonably impressed with the improvised performance.

But the player was grumpy, and the music was not helping as it should.

He’d forgotten--willfully forgotten, blocked from his ability to recall--some very important things recently. He retained enough to know why it had been important, and he even still agreed. But the not-remembering was part of what made him grumpy.

But so, in one particular instance, did remembering.

“Never be cruel,” he had admonished his friend Clara, who was now part of what he could no longer entirely remember, “and never be cowardly; and if you are, always make amends!”

His conscience kept returning to a couple of particular moments, like that one, and he really wished it would leave him alone. Not that it was bad advice. It was very good advice to someone who wanted to model their life after his own. Even during the interregnum when he disclaimed the title, “Doctor”, it was advice he had still tried hard to follow.

And therein lie the problem. He had abandoned that credo, along with nearly everything else that had ever defined him, in one burst of focused anger, in the name of saving his friend. He’d done it without ever stopping to think if his friend actually could be saved, and now that his anger had long-since cooled, he was forced to accept that he had behaved very, very badly, and to no good purpose. Half-remembered Clara might enjoy a few more adventures in the diner-disguised TARDIS where he had last encountered her (and not then recognized her, although he had since come to realize who she had to be), but eventually, she would have to return to the moment from which the Time Lords extracted her, and die in a flashing moment of agony as the quantum shade claimed her life.

He had little remorse over his exile of Rassilon. Sister Ohila might berate that as cruel, or cowardly, but the Doctor remained firm in his judgement that it was better than the old monster deserved. 

He felt a little bit of remorse over his exile of the High Council. They had been cowed by Rassilon into complicity with his atrocities, including his plan to save the Time Lords by destroying everything else. But they were not the initiators of those atrocities.

These were not the thoughts that disturbed his peace of mind, that kept the marvelous sound of the guitar in the TARDIS’ perfect sound system from improving his mood.

He’d shot a man in the chest.

The man who never uses weapons had shot an unarmed man in the chest, justifying it as another punishment for complicity in the Time War and in his own torture, and excusing it with the knowledge that his victim would regenerate.

He. The Doctor. Had murdered a man in cold blood.

Then he’d done what he always did. Ran like hell. Compounded his crime by stealing another TARDIS, and worse, through negligence, allowed it to fall into non-Gallifreyan hands.

And now, the man...well, woman, now...he had shot wanted to talk. The message had been surprisingly respectful, addressed to the “Provisional Lord President of the High Council of Gallifrey”, broaching none of the difficult topics that lay between them. Simply asking for an interview, somewhere-and-somewhen neutral, and leaving the choice of coordinates to The Doctor, to discuss the future direction and security of “the world we both love.”

The General had him there. He did love Gallifrey. He didn’t really belong there--never had. He didn’t love what the War had done to Gallifrey, but he loved Gallifrey.

And he had usurped the Presidency, shot his General In Chief, and run away.

Abruptly, the music stopped. Taking a deep breath, the Doctor set aside the guitar, sent a reply, and set the coordinates.

###

The Maldovarium had not changed much since its proprietor had not-entirely-voluntarily retired to the vaults of the Headless Monks. Busy, noisy, loud, the air filled with traces of various vaporized intoxicants, not all of them legal. All kinds of business were transacted here, all the time.

So the Doctor reminded himself by way of justification for having chosen this location for his meeting. It was an odd place for an ostensible head of state to meet his ostensible chief military officer, but it was safe.

He’d had little trouble securing a booth with a privacy screen, and a few seconds with the sonic had ensured that any bugs there might have been were fried.

The General arrived only a few minutes later. The Doctor decided to at least try to get this conversation off on the right foot, and stood in a sign of respect as the General came through the privacy screen.

Taking on the role of host, more than leader, the Doctor gestured at the seat opposite him. “Please be comfortable. Can I get you some refreshment?”

He had expected the General to be hostile, barely restrained. But she was calm and gracious, and even smiled at the question. “Perhaps...does this place have the Tellurian drink called ‘coffee’, by any chance?”

The Doctor returned the smile. “Some of the best, or so I’m told. One moment.” There was an ordering pad at the table, and he used it to call up a mug of their best coffee, and tea for himself as he sat down. Five seconds later, two mugs materialized on the table.

They sipped their beverages in silence--except for an appreciative sigh from the General--that began to become awkward after perhaps a minute, after which each blurted out, “Before we start, I have something I want to…”

There was laughter, of course. Brittle, awkward, but laughter. Even with a deadly enemy, that sort of moment could be funny. Finally, the General said, “You’re the President. You go first.”

At this, the Doctor sobered. He wondered at this insistence that he was somehow still the President, but that was not what he had begun to say, and he didn’t want to be distracted. This part was going to be hard enough. Finally, averting his eyes, he blurted, “I shouldn’t have shot you. I don’t really expect you to forgive it, but of every single thing I’ve ever done--and I’ve done some pretty wild things--that may be the single worst thing I can remember, and I shouldn’t have done it.”

It wasn’t exactly an apology, in so many words. “I’m sorry” just didn’t seem appropriate, somehow--too weak, too trite, too something and not enough of another. 

The General heard him, still surprisingly calm, and gave appearance of digesting what he’d said. “Well...we shouldn’t have done what we did with your confession dial. It was not my idea, and I did not approve of it, but I did not protest or prevent it, either.”

This, also, was not exactly an apology. Behind both their statements were all the unspoken justifications, but neither one chose this moment to rehearse them. 

Instead, the Doctor said, very simply, “Thank you.”

“Thank you,” the General responded.

There was another pause, then the Doctor said, “Is it really that easy?”

The General responded. “Shouldn’t it be?”

The Doctor thought about that. The had done terrible things to one another, but they were Time Lords. Each was actually capable of much worse.

“I’m satisfied if you are. I can’t remember the last time I heard a member of the High Council actually admit they shouldn’t have done something, so that alone makes it all worth it,” the Doctor said at length.

The General responded, “I’m satisfied. And quite content with how regeneration treated me, this time around. I won’t say I would have preferred to come to it by natural causes, but this is a good incarnation.”

“It does suit you.”

The General smiled slightly, and nodded in acknowledgement over her coffee. There was another silence as each further digested the defusing of tension between them, and enjoyed their beverages.

Once again, the Doctor broke the silence. “You didn’t call me here just for that, though.”

“No. May I be blunt?”

“Please!”

“Gallifrey needs a government.”

The Doctor took a moment responding. He started several sentences, then stopped as he realized what he was about to say was not valid. The Council had been exiled shortly after Rassilon. During his brief stint as Lord President--a presidency he’d enjoyed more or less by a combination of military fiat and default--he had done nothing to provide for a new one. 

“So form one!”

“I can’t. Not without your approval.”

“Please. I’m only the President because you started calling me that after I kicked Rassilon out. Conquest is no way to hand over a presidency.”

“And yet, you did, for all intents and purpose, conquer. It might not be constitutional, but the constitution was largely ignored once Rassilon awoke, anyway. We need to get back to it...but to do that, we need a government, which has to be appointed by the President.”

“Which is me.”

“If only by default, yes.”

“Why not you? You could appoint yourself and no one would argue it.”

“I’m a General, not a politician. I don’t know if it would even be appropriate for me to serve in a new government. The War is over. We need a government for peacetime.”

“Oh, no! You’re not off the hook that easily. You say I need to appoint a government?”

“Someone has to, and you are currently accepted, despite everything, as President. Don’t get me wrong. I know how you feel about political power. I knew you would attempt to demur. I went to every surviving cardinal of every college of Time Lords. None of them were willing to act without your approval. None of them felt they could be certain you wouldn’t return, unpredictably, and assert your authority again. Most of Gallifrey has no idea what happened down in the Cloisters. You are still their hero.”

The Doctor made a face at that, but addressed a different point. “Why do you think you shouldn’t serve in a peacetime government?”

The General stood up at that, agitated. She held her coffee cup tightly, as a comfort, as she paced a few minutes. “Your companion was right.”

“About what?”

“I was too long a General, too long a member of Rassilon’s circle of war-driven insanity. I became--I am--something of a monster. Gallifrey needs people untainted by such things.”

“We’d have to go pretty far afield to find them. And given the things we both just admitted we shouldn’t have done to each other, if that sort of thing disqualifies you, it certainly disqualifies me. You know some of what I did during the War.”

The General considered this in silence. Finally, she sat, a bit calmer.

“Better,” the Doctor said. “Gallifrey may no longer need a warrior, but it’s always needed a strong, intelligent guardian. I abolish the emergency office of General in Chief, and revive the constitutional office of Castellan. I nominate you.”

She thought for a moment, meeting his eyes directly for the first time in the entire conversation. “I accept.”

“We’ll need a Chancellor,” the Doctor said then. “Someone we can trust to manage the day to day business. I assume you’ve realized I’m not coming home. Not staying there, anyway. President or not, you and I both know I don’t really belong there. That makes it all the more important that the Chancellor be someone everyone will accept to make the key decisions, and only come to me for things the constitution requires. Someone who can stand for a proper election to take my place after a little while.”

They each pondered the question for a while, sipping absently at their drinks while they each went through the same list in their minds--the relatively short list of highly placed Time Lords who were still alive, and not tainted by too close an association with the old Council.

The Doctor suddenly had an idea, and laughed out loud at it. “Is Spandrell still alive?”

The General--the Castellan--blinked. “He is. We released him shortly after you left.”

“Released him?”

“Rassilon had imprisoned him for political unreliability.”

“Perfect!”

“I’m not so sure. He’s very bitter at how he was treated. Many of the cardinals might balk…”

“Even if I’m present to inaugurate the government personally?”

“I thought…”

“I said I wouldn’t come home to stay. If I’m going to play at being president for a while, though I probably ought to preside every now and then, don’t you think?”

The Castellan looked relieved. “Yes. I think that would work. The’ll still complain, but they’ll behave. And I think if you ask him yourself, he’ll agree.”

The Doctor nodded. “Let’s do it that way, then. I’ll follow you home, we’ll talk to Spandrell. Then you and Spandrell can take a few days to figure out who else should round out the Council, and we can get the show on the show on the road.”

“And you can run away again?” From another person, or in a different tone of voice, the question would have reopened all the wounds they’d just bound up. But the Doctor took it at face value.

“Probably, yes. Like I said, I don’t belong there. Maybe some day, but not now.”

The Castellan nodded, accepting if not understanding. “Shall we make a start, then?”

“Yes, I think so...except...once more question.”

“Yes?”

“Clara.”

“There’s nothing we can do--”

“I know. And I did much more than I should have, as I said. Did she...has she come back. Is she…”

The Castellan looked thoughtful. “Yes, and no.”

“That’s a bit vague.”

“She has not yet returned to us. Every indication is that her death remains a Fixed Point, unchanged and unchangeable. And yet, time has not yet fractured. From this, we surmise that, eventually, she will return. In the meantime, we have people discreetly keeping an eye on her, and we’ve always kept an eye on her immortal associate, as you’ve no doubt surmised. They won’t be allowed to do anything untoward.”

The Doctor nodded slowly, finally saying, “Good enough. Let’s get on with it, then.”

“Actually…”

“Yes?”

“Can I get another cup of coffee first. It really is very good.”

**Author's Note:**

> Continuity note: Spandrell, mentioned above, was Castellan of the Citadel during "The Deadly Assassin". He hasn’t been seen on-screen since, so seemed fair game. This story was born out of my intense desire to see the Doctor do right, both by the General and by Gallifrey as a whole. My one dissatisfaction with “Hell Bent” is that so much in that regard is left unresolved, and not in a way that promised eventual resolution.


End file.
